Chapter XIV: Gentlemen Adventurers

‟MOTHER, could Rex and I go for a picnic?” Billy’s eager face showed at the dining-room window. Behind him Rex peeped in, more sober, but evidently just as anxious.

“A picnic?” Mrs. Weston said, bewildered. “What, all by yourselves?”

“Well, there’s no one to go with us,” Billy said. “The Lawrences are coming out to play tennis, and _we_ can’t play when big people are there. You know it’s always a case of picking the balls up, for Rex and me, and a bit of extra cake is all we get out of it! And we’d love a ride. Couldn’t we take some lunch and go out? It would be no end of fun.”

“But is Rex safe? You know, he has never gone far without Father.”

“Oh, abso-lutely!” said Billy, with evident pride in the long word. “He really rides quite decently now, don’t you, Rexona?”

“I’ll give you a hiding if you call me that,” stated his guest.

“Sorry—it was a slip,” Billy said, grinning. “Forgot you didn’t like soap. But he can ride all right, Mother; Father says so. And we’d be awfully careful, and keep our weather-eye out for snakes, and all that sort of thing. Anyhow, the ground’s so bare you can see a snake half a mile off. Oh, do let’s go!”

“What do you say, girls?” Mrs. Weston asked.

“I don’t think they could damage themselves, do you, Jean?” Jo asked.

“No, I don’t think so,” her twin answered. “They’re really quite safe, if they promise to be sensible. I’d rather you didn’t jump, Rex, when you’re by yourselves.”

“All right, I won’t,” Rex promised eagerly.

“Then may we go, Mother?”

“Well, you must ask Father. I couldn’t let you go without his consent.”

“But may we say you say we may?”

“Is that a poem?” asked Rex solemnly, “or just a ‘hidden-word’ competition?”

“Oh, be quiet, donkey!” said Billy, joining in the general laugh. “You know what I mean, Mother—may we?”

“Oh, yes,” said Mrs. Weston. “If you’ll really promise to be careful.” Then, as the racing feet of the petitioners carried them out of earshot, “You really think it’s safe, girls?”

“I don’t see how they can get into any trouble,” Jean said: “Rex can ride quite decently, and Merrilegs is so steady. And they can swim—not that there’s enough water in the river to drown them, even if they couldn’t.”

“And I do like to see Rex getting independent,” added Jo. “He’s twice the boy he was, in that respect. They’ll feel just like men, going off together on their own account, bless them!”

“Father says we may!” shrilled a high, ecstatic voice from afar off: and in a moment Rex was back at the window, flushed and eager.

“It’s all right, Mrs. Weston! And Billy’s gone to run the ponies up, and he says, please, twins, will you fix up some grub for us—lots of grub, please? I’m off to help him.” He was gone, like an arrow.

“Come along, Jo,” said Jean, laughing. “Good old thick sandwiches, with the crust left on, I suppose. It’s a mercy we made extra cake!”

They stood together at the yard gate, twenty minutes later, to watch the pair ride away, each boy with a respectable parcel of lunch tied to his saddle. Their Scout blouses bulged in a peculiar way that suggested apples. They dug their heels into their ponies’ sides, and departed at full gallop, uttering demoniacal yells after the approved fashion of Red Indians.

“Nice kids!” said Jo inelegantly. “Hurry up, Jean; I’ve got a frock to iron, and there’s heaps to do. The Lawrences said they’d be out early.”

It was Saturday, and the spell of heat still lay upon the land. Everywhere was the thick blue haze that told of far-off bush-fires; although the Gulgong Flat fires had been checked, there had been other outbreaks, and there were miles of burnt country where charred logs and trees were smouldering; ready, should a wind spring up, to send burning fragments far enough to start a fresh blaze. Day after day the water shrank in the creeks and rivers, and the little remnant of dried grass grew less and less; day after day the worry-lines deepened on the faces of the men who saw their sheep and cattle grow weaker and weaker. The household at Emu Plains was cheery enough, to all outward seeming, for Mr. and Mrs. Weston had determined that the shadow should not lie heavily on the boys and girls there, if they could keep it from them awhile yet. But at night, when the children were in bed, they talked long together; and often it was hard next morning to follow the Scout prescription,—“Keep smiling!”—which they had adopted as the rule of the house.

There was no shadow resting on the small boys’ solitary picnic. Beyond doubt, it was a great adventure to ride out alone into the wide paddocks where a hundred interesting things might happen. They were Red Indians first; braves armed with deadly weapons and intent on scalps: they rode stealthily in the timber, keeping a keen look-out for palefaces and wolves; ejaculating “Hist!” when a leaf rustled, and stalking the sound in single file, prepared for anything, from a grizzly bear to a hostile Choctaw. Then a fox slipped away into the open, and on the instant they were pig-stickers, bursting out of the Indian jungle. They raced after him across a bare plain, Merrilegs hopelessly outdistanced by the swifter Punch, until an unexpected turn on the part of the quarry gave Rex a chance of cutting across and getting in the lead, where he remained until the fox dived under a fence to safety. This was triumph, and he exulted openly.

“Yah! Beat you!”

“He beat both of us,” said Billy, laughing.

“Yes, but I was nearest to him when he got away. Good old Merrilegs!” boasted Rex, patting his ancient steed.

They ate their lunch in a shady hollow near the river. It was a noble lunch, with a solid foundation of sandwiches and cake, and such added details as mince-pies, dried figs and prunes, and a package of toffee!

“There’s no mistake, the girls do know how to pack a lunch!” said the sated Billy, lying back on the ground. A large lump of toffee impeded, but by no means prevented, speech.

“They’re great!” agreed Rex, similarly employed. “D’you know, I used to hate girls!”

“Don’t you now?”

“Not like I used to, since I knew Jean and Jo. They’ve made me think better of girls!” said the philosopher of nine. “The sort I used to see at home were awful! They were all pretty old—about seventeen or eighteen—and they used to put powder on their noses. And some of ’em wanted to kiss me. Now that’s a thing Jean and Jo have never done!”

“I s’pecs they don’t think you’d be up to much to kiss,” said Billy, grinning. “I don’t, either!”

“Nobody wants you to, smarty!” returned Master Forester. “I was awfully afraid they would, though. But they’re so jolly and so sensible. They really don’t seem to me like girls at all!”

“Well, they’ve really got as much sense as if they were boys,” Billy agreed. “I thought I’d be able to do as I jolly well liked when I heard they were going to teach me. But——” he paused, with a grin.

“But you don’t, do you?”

“Not much!” said Billy. “And all the same, they never get exactly wild. I don’t know how it is. They’ve got a queer way of just expecting you to be decent, and so it just happens.”

“Yes, and they’re never bossy,” Rex remarked. “Old Miss Green, now—she just _was_ bossy. She used to finish up everything with, ‘Now, Rex, obey me instantly!’” He imitated Miss Green’s high falsetto squeak.

“And so you never did, I suppose?”

“Well, not if I could help it!”

“And didn’t you get into rows?”

“Oh—not much.” Rex shrugged his thin little shoulders. “She hardly ever told Mother, and if she did, I didn’t get much done to me, ’cause I was nearly always sick.” He paused, and his face grew red. “You know, I didn’t mind taking advantage of that then. It didn’t seem to matter, with old Miss Green. But if I did it now, with the twins, I’d feel awfully low-down.”

“I should think you would,” agreed Billy. “But then, you aren’t sick now, ever, so it wouldn’t be any good.”

“No. But I guess I wouldn’t do it, anyhow,” said Rex, reddening more deeply.

This was as far as soul-analysis would reasonably take small boys, and they fell silent, pitching dry grass-roots sleepily at the little brown lizards that ran over some big stones near them. Presently they grew tired of inaction, and went roaming along the river-bank. Rex had long ago fought down his fear of climbing; they “shinned up” wattle-trees in search of gum, and practised gymnastics on the low, swinging branches of other trees. Then a rabbit darted out of a hole near by, and they chased it wildly, dodging hither and thither among the stones: the chase coming to an end when the rabbit found another hole, and whisked down it with a final twist of his white tail. They wandered aimlessly back towards the ponies and Rex almost trod on a big black snake, which lay sunning itself in a dusty patch. He jumped back, with a little cry. It was the first snake he had seen, and he had all the town boy’s dread of the evil thing.

“Watch-him-while-I-get-a-stick!” said Billy, all in one word.

He darted aside, and in a moment came racing back with a stick. The snake was just slipping away through the grass; Billy brought down the stick with a quick blow that broke its back.

“Run, Billy! Oh, do run!” Rex cried, shrinking back from the creature that thrashed wildly round on the ground. He caught at Billy’s sleeve. “You’ll only be killed. Do run!”

“Run!” ejaculated Billy, in huge scorn. “Whatever for? He can’t move, bless you. He’s done—his back’s broken.”

“You never broke it, did you?”

“Rather! He’d be a mile away by now if I hadn’t.”

“But you couldn’t break it with a little hit like that!”

“Oh, well, I s’pose you know all about it!” Billy uttered. “Think I never killed a snake before? How many’ve you killed yourself, I’d like to know? That chap’s never going to bite any one again, anyhow!”

“But he’s not dead! He’s moving!”

Indeed, “moving” was a mild term to apply to the struggles of the black snake.

“’Course he’s moving, you little silly!” said Billy, in superb scorn. “But he isn’t getting anywhere, is he? Only his head ’n’ his tail’s moving: ’n’ that’s only what’s called nerfs. Nerfs are things that keep wriggling long after a snake’s dead.”

“But he isn’t safe!”

“Well, he isn’t if you go near the business end of him,” Billy answered, keenly pleased with his mastery of the situation. Rex could beat him at boxing, but when it came to dealing with a snake, he, too, was evidently a prey to “nerfs.” “Only no one but an idjit goes near a snake’s head, even if he’s dead. Father puts his heel on the heads of the snakes he kills, but he made me promise not to. That chap’s back’s broken, an’ he couldn’t never move from where he is till he died. ’Course, it would be cruel not to finish killing him: I’d have finished ever so long ago if you hadn’t kept grabbing at me!”

His stick sang in the air again, and came down just behind the snake’s head.

“That’s done for a lot of his ole nerfs!” said Billy, darkly. He continued the slaying of the reptile, with the thoroughness dear to every boy.

“’Tisn’t hard. You have a hit and see if it is. You only got to keep your hair on an’ hit straight.”

“Can I really?” Rex asked. Gingerly he took the stick and whacked the unpleasant remnant of the snake.

“It isn’t hard, is it? Do you think I killed a bit of him?” he asked, his face glowing.

“Oh, I s’pecs you did,” admitted Billy, who felt he could afford to be generous. “Now you can say you aren’t quite a new-chum any more. Next snake we meet you’ll have to tackle on your own!”

“Shall I, really? I believe I’d be scared.”

“Not you. It’s dead easy. Why, I killed my first when I was six, and you’re nine!” They moved on, Rex feeling that the sum of his out-back experiences had been considerably developed.

The ponies awaited them under a shady light-wood tree, drooping sleepy heads in the hot afternoon stillness. They saddled them and rode on, looking for new worlds to conquer.

“Where’ll we go?” Rex said.

“I d’no. There’s so much smoke about that every place looks the same,” Billy answered. He suddenly broke out in youthful impatience of the long drought. “My word, I’ll be glad when we get rain! It just is sickenin’, seeing the place all burnt up to a cinder with heat and dryness! By rights there ought to be green grass everywhere, all thick ’n’ long, ’n’ simply scrumptious to gallop over. I’ve seen it on these flats many a time so high I could tie it over Merrilegs’ neck!”

“Go on! Is that a yarn?”

“No, it isn’t. It’s plain truth. An’ everywhere you could see cattle and sheep, thick as anything, an’ all rolling fat. ’Cept the stores, of course.”

“What’s stores?”

“Cattle that aren’t fat,” said Billy, in blank amazement at such ignorance. “They’re stores when you buy ’em first, an’ then you put ’em on good paddocks an’ watch ’em fatten. Then you sell ’em for heaps of money.”

“Is that how your father gets his living?”

“Yes, of course it is.”

“Then how does he get a living now?”

“He doesn’t,” said Billy simply.

“Well, but . . . but . . . he’s going _on_ living, isn’t he, silly?”

“Oh, well, you don’t expect him to turn up his toes an’ die as soon as a drought comes,” Billy said, laughing. “Of course, every one has money in Banks and things. That’s what Banks are for. You stick money in ’em when times are good, and then there’s something to live on when they’re bad.”

“And do the Banks just shell it out when you want it?”

“You bet they do. Why, they wouldn’t dare to keep it—the police would get them. It isn’t really their money—it’s the money people have put in. They’d just better try to stick to it, an’ I bet they’d see!”

“Well, I don’t see what the Banks get out of it,” Rex said doubtfully. “Who pays ’em?”

“Blessed if I know,” Billy answered, without any sympathy for the difficulties of financial institutions. “I s’pecs they’ve got their own ways of making a living. The one in Barrabri must be jolly fond of Father, ’cause I heard Mr. Holmes say to him, ‘Don’t you worry, old man: the Bank will stick to you.’ But I know Father reckons he hasn’t got enough money in it, an’ that’s why we’re so jolly poor now.”

“Are you poor?” queried Rex, round-eyed.

“Oh, horrid poor,” Billy answered lightly. “But it doesn’t seem to matter much: we have lots of fun, I say, Rex, s’pose we ride round the back paddock where we went with Father that day, an’ have a look at the bullocks. I s’pect he’d be glad to know how they are; I heard him say he must go out there next week, so we might save him the trouble.”

“Right-oh!” Rex agreed.

They shook the ponies into a canter, and, after following the winding of the river for a time, struck across the paddock to a gate. Passing through this, they found themselves in the back paddock of the Emu Plains run. It was a wide stretch of plain, sloping gently back to the river that formed Mr. Weston’s southern boundary, and at present it represented almost all the grazing land on which he could still run cattle. There was coarse grass on it, rough and poor: still, it meant something of a living for cattle, dry as it was, for the water in the river was good, and good water helps stock to live on very poor fare.

There were very few cattle in sight on the plain, and the boys trotted across to the timber near the river, where they knew they would find the bullocks sheltering from the fierce sun. It was not very easy to distinguish anything, so thick was the smoke-haze. Dense as it had been all day, in this corner of the run it was worse than anywhere else.

“My word, you’d think the fires were close!” Billy uttered. “Let’s go over to the corner by Moncrieff’s, Rex, and see if we can see any sign of ’em.”

“What if we did?” queried Rex.

“Well, it’d mean we’d have to fly round,” said Billy, speaking as one might speak of an earthquake, without any real belief that such a thing might happen. “Fight it, if we could: but I don’t s’pose we could do anything to stop it. We’d have to get the cattle out, and get word to Father. It would be rather a lark, if it didn’t do much damage. They’ve never let me go out if there was a fire, an’ I’ve always wanted to.” He broke off, peering through the haze: then he spoke excitedly. “Rex, I’m not sure, but I could nearly swear I saw flames! Did you see anything? Over there in Moncrieff’s.” He pointed to the southeast.

“I don’t see anything but smoke,” said Rex, straining his eyes.

“Neither do I, now, but I’ll swear I saw a flash of flames—high up. Let’s gallop over and see!”

They raced over the dry grass, keeping just outside the timber. The boundary fence loomed up presently out of the haze, and then Billy uttered a cry.

“My word, it is burning, Rex! Look—can’t you see men working at it?”

There were red flashes of fire coming out of the smoke-drift in the next paddock, and, as they looked, a burning tree sent a tongue of flame skyward. Here and there they could make out the forms of men, beating out the fire in the grass. It was difficult to see how much fire there was: but presently a blazing stick fell from the top of a tree, and, caught by a sudden eddy of wind high up, sailed towards them for a moment and then dropped, a blaze springing up the moment it touched the grass. A man on a smart pony came tearing across to it, and beat it out. Then he caught sight of the two little figures at the fence and galloped to them.

“It’s Mr. Moncrieff!” Billy exclaimed.

“Is that you, Billy?” The man peered at them with smoke-reddened eyes. “Is your father about?”

“No; he’s at home, Mr. Moncrieff,” Billy said. “Is the fire very bad?”

“Bad enough. We’re holding it at present, and, luckily, what wind there is is helping us. But we may not be able to keep it back—if the wind changed to the east your place will go like smoke. I’d have moved your cattle, only we can’t spare a hand.” He looked at them doubtfully. “Are you boys by yourselves? I suppose you couldn’t get the cattle out?”

“We’ll jolly well try,” cried Billy. “Oh, Mr. Moncrieff, keep it back if you can—it’s all the grass Father’s got left!”

“I know that well enough,” the neighbour said. “Every one of us would keep it off your father’s place if work will do it. But it’s most likely it will beat us. Shift the stock if you can, Billy, and get word to your father as soon as you do it: we want all the help we can get. My word, there’s another blaze starting——!” He wheeled his pony and went off at full gallop.

“Come on, Rex!” Billy said, pulling his pony round.

“What have we got to do?” Rex kicked Merrilegs into a gallop, racing beside him.

“Get the cattle out of the paddock, through that gate we came through. You know how we mustered ’em with Father that day we came out? Well, we’ve got to do the same, and as hard as we can lick, ’cause the fire may be here any minute. If it does, I don’t know what we ought to do,” said poor Billy, feeling suddenly that he was only a very small boy. “Cut for the gate ourselves, I suppose: we mustn’t get trapped in the timber. Ride all you know, Rex, an’ yell like the mischief! I’ll go in near the river, an’ you keep towards this edge of the timber. Drive ’em in front of you, an’ try to edge ’em out on the plain if you can, like we did with Father.”

The cattle were standing about among the trees, uneasy with the smoke and with the all-pervading smell of fire. To them suddenly appeared two small demons on ponies, who rushed at them, shouting and waving threatening arms. Hither and thither through the trees the demons rushed, and the noise of their yelling was as the noise of ten. It was no use to try to evade them: no use to slink into the shelter of a clump of bushes, or to pretend to gallop clumsily off for a few yards in the hope of persuading them that you were an obedient bullock. Both were bad demons: but the smaller one was infinitely the more horrible of the two, for he was like a will-o’-the-wisp among the trees, and he rode a black pony that was a demon in itself, and just as alive as its rider to the ways of bullocks. The other invader was slower, but he had a high, shrill voice that was very terrible, and his eyes seemed to be of glass, and reflected the light in a most alarming manner. The bullocks decided that their only salvation lay in flight. The infection of their terror spread quickly among them, and the timber was soon full of the sound of frightened bellowing and pounding hoofs, with the high shrill cries of the boys sounding over all.

“Keep looking behind you,” Billy panted, meeting Rex for a moment. “Don’t let any of ’em break back if you can help it.” He shot off again, yelling at a bullock that had dropped from a gallop into a jog-trot: and the bullock shook his head in terror and galloped anew.

As for Rex, Merrilegs had taken possession of him. Every horse on Emu Plains was thoroughly trained to stock work, and Merrilegs was the oldest of them all. What he lacked in speed he made up in cunning: he had an uncanny fore-knowledge of what a beast would do, and his twistings and turnings and sudden rushes were more like the work of a dog than a horse. A hundred times Rex was nearly off, saving himself only by desperate clutching at the pommel: a hundred times he barely saved his leg from the trunk of a tree, or ducked just in time to avoid an overhanging limb. At first he was sick with fear: and then the wild excitement of the moment took hold of him, and he forgot himself altogether, and let Merrilegs take him where he would. The pony did the work: the boy clung to the pommel and drummed with his heels on the lean grey sides, and yelled!

In their inexperience and comparative helplessness the little fellows accomplished what men, with quieter methods, might have failed to do. They actually started a stampede among the cattle; and the quick sense of overmastering fear leaped from beast to beast until every bullock in the paddock was on the run. They burst out of the timber in a whirlwind, converging to a point on the plain where they could see their galloping leaders. Behind them Rex and Billy raced, with scarlet faces and very little voices left.

“Can you keep ’em going?” Billy gasped. “I’ll get round ’em and open the gate.”

He shot off to one side, crouching low on his pony’s neck; and for a moment Rex felt blank terror. What should he do, if the cattle turned and came charging back to the shelter of the timber? What power had he to stop them? Luckily, the problem was not given to him to solve. Billy kept well away from the cattle, swinging round them in a wide half-circle; and Merrilegs dropped to a canter, keeping them moving in the right direction, while Rex continued to utter mechanical yells in a kind of cracked yelp. Billy swung the gate open to its fullest extent, and then came racing back as he had gone, well out from the bullocks, until he could swing in behind them and push them on.

To the bullocks the open gate and the sun-dried plain beyond offered respite from the demons in the rear. They jostled each other through the opening, and lumbered away at full gallop, spreading out as they went.

“We’ve done it, Rex!” Billy gasped: “an’ I never thought we would. _They_ can’t be burnt anyhow.” His face was scarlet, and his hat was gone, but his eyes were dancing. He held the gate for Rex to pass through. “I say, do you think you can hurry home an’ take word to Father? I’m going back to help.”

“Not to the fire?”

“Rather. Some one ought to be there to help keep it off Emu Plains. You can get home all right, can’t you, Rex? Merrilegs will take you.”

“I can get home all right,” Rex said. “But you—will you be safe, Billy?”

“’Course I will.”

“But you said they didn’t let you go to fires.”

“I’m letting myself go to this one,” Billy returned. “Think I’m going home now—to sit down an’ have tea? My word, no—I’m goin’ back with the men!”

“Couldn’t I come too?”

“We can’t both go—some one must take word to Father. Oh, do go, Rex!” Billy begged.

“You haven’t even got your hat!” said poor Rex, in a final protest.

“I know where I dropped it—I’ll get it. Cut along, old chap!” He latched the gate as he spoke, and, swinging round, went off at a hard gallop, Punch’s little hoofs drumming over the baked ground. Rex looked after him enviously, feeling suddenly lonely. Then it came to him that after all he had a job of importance: was he not a despatch-rider? If you cannot be in the firing-line, it is at least something to bear despatches. The small boy cheered, and sent Merrilegs galloping for home.

It was a queer version of the usually spic-and-span Master Forester who came, a little later, on the tennis-party at home. Afternoon tea was in progress, and Jo was just handing her father a cup when the little boy came up the path. He was still scarlet-faced, and his fair hair drooped in a lank lock over his forehead: there was an angry red mark from brow to chin where a branch of a sapling had struck him, swinging back after the rush of a bullock. One sleeve of his blouse hung in tatters, and there was a big triangular tear in his trousers, while his stockings, in rags, hung round his ankles. His knees were scarred and cut. But he was undeniably happy.

Mrs. Weston was the first to catch sight of him.

“Good gracious!” she ejaculated. “Whatever is the matter, Rex?”

Every one was looking at him. He stammered a little as he tried to speak.

“There’s a fire,” he said. “Near your back paddock, Mr. Weston. I ’specs it’s in it by now!”

“Good heavens!” uttered John Weston, putting down his cup hurriedly. “The cattle!”

“Oh, we’ve got the cattle out,” Rex said, doing his best to speak unconcernedly. “Billy and me. We had a great time. They’re all right—I think we got them all.”

“Where is Billy?” put in Billy’s mother sharply.

“He’s fighting the fire. There’s a lot of men there. Billy went back to help them. He told me to come and tell you. They’re going to do their level best to keep it out of your paddock.”

“John!” Mrs. Weston’s voice was a cry.

“He’ll be all right, dear,” Mr. Weston said. “The men will take care of him. I’ll go out at once. Jump on Merrilegs, Jean, and run up Cruiser for me while I change: I won’t be five minutes.” He went off across the grass with long strides, turning just for a moment to Rex. “Good boy, Rex: you’re a real man!” he said.

“Sit down, Rex dear,” Mrs. Weston said.

The despatch-rider sat down. Other bearers of despatches, he knew, from the stories he had read, finished with great excitement: generally their horses dropped dead in the last furlong, or they themselves swooned on delivering their message. But Merrilegs was already tearing off, with Jean on his back: and he himself had no desire to swoon: no desire for anything, indeed, except for tea. He eyed Mr. Weston’s untasted cup wolfishly, and licked his dry lips. There was no sort of polish left to him.

“My word, I’d like that cup of tea!” he said.